RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16055/iran-tom-and-jerry

The mullahs have threatened “dire consequences” if the US does try to stop the tankers. Since the Islamic Republic lacks the naval power to escort the tankers right down to Venezuelan ports, the “dire consequences” would not come in the form of a naval battle in the Caribbean. Instead, as the daily Kayhan, expressing “Supreme Guide” Ali Khamenei’s views, said in an editorial Monday, retaliation may come in the form of a seizure of one or more US oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz. Another option is targeting all oil tankers in the waterway for a fixed period as Iran did in 1988.

Last week, the ayatollah called for the formation of a “young Hezbollahi government”, serving notice that President Hassan Rouhani and his “New York Boys”, now old and not Hezbollahi enough, are moving towards the exit.

Khamenei has compared his struggle with the American “Great Satan” with the Tom and Jerry conflicts in the word of Hollywood cartoons. On many occasions viewers think that the playful mouse is done for, only for him to dodge the cat and bounce back with a new trick.

Four decades of Tom & Jerry Iranian-style was made possible by the gullibility and impatience of Americans who always wanted quick results, took their wishes for reality, and allowed the mischievous/playful mouse to live another day for another adventure.

Is a military clash between the United States and Iran inevitable? Since January, when the Americans assassinated Tehran’s top general, Qassem Soleimani, policy circles in major capitals have grappled with the question without reaching a consensus.

At the time of this writing, the question is bouncing back as Iranian tankers carrying oil to Venezuela risk running into an American cordon designed to keep them away.

The mullahs have threatened “dire consequences” if the US does try to stop the tankers. Since the Islamic Republic lacks the naval power to escort the tankers right down to Venezuelan ports, the “dire consequences” would not come in the form of a naval battle in the Caribbean. Instead, as the daily Kayhan, expressing “Supreme Guide” Ali Khamenei’s views, said in an editorial Monday, retaliation may come in the form of a seizure of one or more US oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz. Another option is targeting all oil tankers in the waterway for a fixed period, as Iran did in 1988.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/hong-kong-lawmaker-mourns-end-homeland-china-mulls-anti-protest-n1212721

By Tesa Arcilla, Adela Suliman, Justin Solomon and Janis Mackey Frayer

HONG KONG — Pro-democracy legislators in Hong Kong on Friday hit back after Beijing introduced a new national security law that could limit protests and dramatically reduce the territory’s autonomy.

“This is the end of Hong Kong and it’s like the end of our homeland,” Tanya Chan, a member of Hong Kong’s Legislative Council, said at the start of China’s annual National People’s Congress in Beijing, where the bill was set to be discussed.

“I recall the time when I was young, and I believed in ‘one country, two systems,’ and I believed we were going to showcase to the world that Hong Kong people can rule Hong Kong,” she added. “But now, I’m not yet 50 years old and suddenly all is gone.”

Fellow lawmaker and chairman of Hong Kong’s Democratic party, Wu Chi-wai, also told NBC News: “The rule of law in Hong Kong is over, because of the implementation of the national security ordinance.”

The territory was handed to China after British colonial rule ended in 1997 and has been governed by a unique model aimed at guaranteeing freedoms not granted on the mainland.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/as-coronavirus-spreads-in-nicaragua-official-denials-amplify-risk-11590246000

Nicaragua has become a coronavirus hot spot in Latin America but its authoritarian leader is endangering public health by ignoring the threat and hiding infection data, according to doctors and relatives of victims.

President Daniel Ortega and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, have refused to introduce quarantines or limits on commerce. “Staying at home is the way to the country’s destruction,” Mr. Ortega said at a rare appearance to deliver a May Day speech.

As of Monday, Nicaragua, with a population of more than six million, had recognized only 25 coronavirus cases and 8 fatalities—and Mr. Ortega declared: “We have been able to counter the pandemic.”

The following day, under pressure from doctors and activists, and facing an overwhelmed health system, the Health Ministry updated its numbers to 254 cases and 17 deaths, without explanation.

That was well short of the count by the Citizen’s Observatory, a watchdog group of doctors and experts, which said on Tuesday it had verified 1,594 cases of Covid-19 in Nicaragua and 351 deaths. Videos posted on social media, local news reports and accounts from relatives of victims suggest the country’s health system is overwhelmed, with hospitals crammed with victims.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-young-country-in-the-coronavirus-age-11590188813?mod=opinion_lead_pos9

A fanfare of flutes and drums. A line of waiflike children clapping in rhythm. Former fighters with white beards singing in unison the anthem of free Bengal. And, stretched between bamboo poles, yellow banners proclaiming: “Welcome Back to Jessore, Veteran Bernard-Henri Lévy!”

I was here almost 50 years ago. I had answered André Malraux’s call to French youth to form an international brigade similar to that of the Spanish Civil War, this time to oppose the crimes of the Pakistani army in what was known as East Pakistan until it declared independence in March 1971. I landed in Kolkata, crossed the border in Satkhira, and ended up 45 miles north in Jessore, which was being pounded by bombs and machine-gun fire.

Then, it hardly qualified as a city. The airport is new. So is the tangle of colonial-era houses, unfinished new buildings and mud huts, and the population of ragged children, zebu cattle dealers, and discouraged beggars. But I recognize the pale sky and the tangy fragrance commingled with cooked coconut oil—and, on leaving the bazaar, the same bleak plain of rice paddies. This is the Bangladesh of my 20s.

Akim Mukherjee was the young Maoist leader who picked me up in Satkhira. Half a century later, I gave his name to Mofidul Hoque of the Liberation War Museum in Dhaka, the capital. He passed it along to the police, who had some trouble finding Akim—the underground Communists of the time went by a dizzying number of noms de guerre. But now here I am at the village house where Akim and I spent a few nights before taking off over marshes of rice and blood in search of Marxist-Leninist brochures, of which Bangladesh was a major producer—research for my first book, later published as “Les Indes Rouges.”